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The COVID-19 pandemic has made people reassess their living arrangements. For some people, this means updating their home to function as a (semi) permanent workspace. For others, it means a major relocation. Relocating can be a significant challenge for single adults. It’s even more of a challenge if you have children. Here are some tips to help.
Stick to a routine (or adjust it slowly)
If you’re staying within the same time zone, keep to your established pattern of meal-times, nap-/bed-times, and wake times. If you’re moving across time zones, then try to change your schedule gradually. Adults (and maybe teenagers) might cope with forcing their body to adapt quickly, but this is usually too harsh for small children.
On a similar note, try to stick to familiar foods, preferably home-cooked. Resist any temptation to reward them with junk food or treats, except in very small quantities. Apart from anything else, you want to discourage them from learning to “comfort eat”.
Make sure you know how to find essential services
As a minimum, you need to know where to find pediatric doctors and dentists. It’s also recommended to review your insurance coverage to make sure it’s suitable for your new home. You’ll also need to think about your child’s (future) education. This may influence your choice of neighborhood.
Remember that your child’s idea of “essential services” may be very different from yours. They may be far more concerned about keeping in touch with old friends and making new ones. They’ll also probably want to continue with established interests and hobbies. Depending on their age, they may want to find a part-time job.
Work out how you’re going to stay connected
These days, you can generally expect any cell phone to work in any urban area. Obviously, if you’re planning on moving out into the wilderness, then different considerations apply. Internet connectivity, however, is another matter. It’s generally easy to find WiFi connections. In fact, you can often find free Wifi. The problems, however, are signal quality, bandwidth, and security.
A lot of public WiFI services have moderate signal quality at best. Some providers try to deal with this by limiting the services which can be accessed from them. Even if neither of these applies, security considerations certainly do, especially with children. Being prepared to spend on mobile data guarantees you a safe connection. If you must use public WiFi, always use a VPN.
Try taking your child on a short visit before the big move
Obviously, there’s a lot of practicalities to consider here. In principle, however, if it is possible, then it’s preferable to make it happen. Looking at a place on the internet is a whole lot better than nothing. In fact, it’s made travel of all kinds easier in many ways. It is, however, not as good as going there personally. That’s basically why people still travel.
If your child has the opportunity to see a place first-hand, then it will be a known quantity to them. As long as their experience of it was positive, they should be less intimidated by the thought of going there again.
Thank you for reading!